The Bombers didn't just beat the number one team in the country on Hockey Night in the North - they shut them out.
Flin Flon took the reins early and never let up, beating the top-ranked Battlefords North Stars 6-0 and, in doing so, clinching a spot in the SJHL playoffs.
The Whitney Forum played host to Hockey Night in the North Friday night, the Bombers' annual free attendance game and the first of its kind since 2020. A total of 1,367 fans strong came to the game, along with a smattering of under-seven players who hit the ice in the first intermission. Hudbay and the local governments of Flin Flon, Creighton and Denare Beach sponsored the evening.
On the free night, it was the Bombers who pushed early and often. Jeremi Tremblay was the first to get a chance, nearly sneaking a wraparound past Josh Kotai, which the Stars' star netminder stopped. Joey Lies came next, getting a point-blank chance on a turnover, but Kotai made another stop. The play got rough early as well, with Bomber captain Lucas Fry and the Stars' Holden Doell getting tangled up in the Stars' zone. The two would get into each others' grills back up the ice near the Bomber bench, with Doell appearing to catch a player on the Bomber bench with a stray punch.
Make no mistake - while this was a regular season game in February, both teams and the fans knew this was playoff hockey.
With penalties going to both sides several plays later, the game went to four-on-four - and it was there that the Bombers drew first blood. Cole Duperreault took a shot on Kotai, which he saved, but Brent Gulenchyn found the puck on a rebound in the slot and beat Kotai, giving the Bombers a 1-0 lead.
Tremblay got another chance on Kotai, ending with another save, but the Bombers dominated play early. At the media timeout halfway through the period, the Bombers had nine shots - the Stars had none.
Battlefords' Kian Bell took a penalty midway through the period, giving the Bombers' powerplay room to cook, and cook they did - Duperreault got his 37th goal of the year, teeing up a feed from Jacob Vockler and blowing right past Kotai. 2-0, home team.
The Stars would finally get a shot on a powerplay 13 minutes in, but it would be a close call - Jake Southgate got a pass and a wide-open chance in the crease, but Harmon Laser-Hume got there in time to make a dramatic goal-line glove save. A Zach Cain shot off the Stars' bar and a massive check by Reece Richmond on the Stars' Colby Bear ended a period that was all Flin Flon. The first period would end 2-0 Bombers.
Battleford blinked first early in the second period, when Keiton Klein hit Richmond from behind and Bear got up close and personal with Richmond while he was on the ground following the hit. Klein and Bear were both tossed from the game, with Klein taking a checking from behind penalty and Bear being given a game misconduct - one he protested loudly from the dressing room tunnel after leaving the ice.
Laser-Hume would be the next Bomber to take a shot, five minutes in - a pile of players knocked Doell's knee into Laser-Hume's head, taking the goalie to the ice for a few moments. Laser-Hume would get back up and stay in the game.
With Stars captain Jake Southgate in the box on a tripping penalty, the Bombers pulled even further ahead, with Noah Houle taking a hard shot from the point that Liam Bridger tipped in.
Cory King then joined the ever-growing list of players given misconducts, but despite having a 20-year-old defender in the box, the Bombers still stood tall. Gulenchyn almost got his second of the night on a shot that rang off the post. Entering the third, the Bombers would have a 3-0 lead.
The Bombers got out of a sticky situation early in the period, where Vockler was almost assessed with a tripping penalty as Doell fell down in the zone. In-rink replay on the scoreboard later showed that Vockler's stick did not touch Doell and that he fell down on his own, leaving the refs to go back on their original decision and not call a penalty.
More rough stuff came later when Wilson Steele of the Stars got tied up with Olafson after a whistle. Steele, all 6-foot-4, 200 pounds of him, looked set to square off with the 5-foot-8, 165-pound Olafson until Matt Egan, a matchup closer to Steele's size, squared up to him. Egan's challenge to Steele would be answered instead by Zane Florence - the two players dropped the mitts and fought to a judges' decision, while all four players would be sent to the showers. Referee Levi Schutz took a stray punch straight to the face, but stayed in the game.
The Stars almost broke their goose-egg early in the period, with Tanner Gold firing a shot from the point that went in the net, but the goal was immediately waved off - Brody Girod collided with Laser-Hume shortly before the goal, leading it to be called off due to goalie interference.
The Bombers would then run away with the end result, with a seeing-eye shot from Alexi Sylvestre barely getting past Kotai, making it 4-0. The Bombers made it 5-0 for a brief second, when Jacob Vockler forced a turnover at centre ice, sprung himself on a breakaway and beat Kotai with a beautiful Pavel Datsyuk-style toe drag dangle - however, the goal was waved off later, with the officials saying that a referee well behind the play had, at some point, blown the play dead before Vockler scored. The score, for the moment, stayed 4-0.
Flin Flon would make it 5-0 anyway moments later, with Alex Von Sprecken firing a powerplay slapper past Kotai with about two minutes on the clock. The Estevan native would run it all back moments later, scoring on exactly the same play moments later to make it 6-0.
Things would get ugly with about 1:40 left on the clock, with Fry and Doell colliding in the corner and players from both teams barrelling into the fray. An old-fashioned Saskatchewan line brawl ensued, but the officials got the better of the situation quickly. Three Stars - Southgate, Doell and Alex Izyk - were tossed, while Fry, Richmond and Vockler were also taken out of the game.
In the final moments, two more players were booted - Bridger for the Bombers, Gold for the Stars - making it a total of eight Stars and six Bombers who would be ejected from the game. More players were sent to the Stars' dressing room than were left on the team's bench by the final whistle. The two teams would combine for a whopping three-and-a-half hours of penalty minutes when it was all settled.
The Bombers, no matter how sparse the bench may have been at the end, still got to celebrate a massive win against the CJHL's number-one ranked team in Canada, doing so in front of a massive crowd.
Laser-Hume got his first shutout since Oct. 21, making just 15 saves on his way. Kotai, despite the end result, played admirably for the Stars, stopping 42 shots on the night.
Battlefords will not see any impact due to the loss in the league standings - the team still sits well atop the table with 83 points on the season. The Bombers, however, will draw back even with Humboldt for second in the league standings with 65 points apiece.
Flin Flon has clinched a spot in the SJHL playoffs, with the team now unable to be caught by any team below eighth place in the league.
The two teams will renew hostilities - this time, in front of a paying crowd - at the Forum Saturday night.
